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Peter Plogojowitz (d. 1725) - Vampire case of Kisilova, Serbia.

Peter Plogojowitz was a farmer who died in 1725 at age 62. Three days after his death, he appeared in his home at midnight and asked his son for food. His son complied, and the father appeared to eat it, and then left. Two nights later, the father appeared again and demanded food. This time, the terrified son refused, whereupon the father fixed him with a most threatening look. The next day, the son died. Within hours, five or six other persons in the village fell ill, suffering total exhaustion and a faintness, as though they lacked blood. All said they had been visited in a dream by the dead Peter Plogojowitz, who seemed to glide into the room, catch them by the throat, bite them hard, and suck the blood out of the wounds. In less than a week, nine persons were dead. Plogojowitz's wife said he came to her in dreams and demanded his opanki, or shoes, be placed next to him in his coffin, because his bare feet were sore from walking about the cobblestoned streets at night.

The villagers resolved to open Plogojowitz's grave and prevailed upon their priest and the imperial provisor of the Gradisk District to grant their request and be present for the viewing. The provisor refused, but was informed by the villagers that they would leave the village out of fear that an evil spirit would destroy them all. The provisor acquiesced.

According to Montague Summers, military officers opened the grave of the Plogojowitz and

... found him as though he were in a trance, gently breathing, his eyes wide open and glaring horribly, his complexion ruddy, the flesh plump and full. His hair and nails had grown, and when the scarfskin came off there appeared new and healthy cuticle. His mouth was all slobbered and stained with fresh blood. Thence they at once concluded it was he who must be the Vampire this molesting the district, and it was necessary at once to put a stop to his ravages in case he should affect the whole village. The executioner armed with a heavy mallet drove a sharp stake through his heart, during which the grave was deluged with the blood that gushed from the wound, his nose, ears and every orifice of the body. A big pyre of logs and brushwood having been built, the body was placed thereon. It was dry weather and the wood when kindled soon burned brightly the flames being fanned by a gentle breeze. In a very short time the body was reduced to ashes. No marks of vampirism being found upon the other bodies they were reburied with due precautions, garlic and whitethorn being placed in the coffins, and thenceforth the village was freed from any molestations.

Also burned were Plogojowitz's shoes.

Summers omits that one other telltale sign of vampirism was that Plogojowitz's corpse had an erection, not uncommon from natural bloating in decomposition, but during these times it was interpreted as a sign of the sexual activities of vampires.

Text from The Encyclopedia of Vampires, Werewolves, and Other Monsters (Checkmark Books, 2005) by Rosemary Guiley

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COPY OF A WRITING FROM THE GRADISKA DISTRICT IN HUNGARY by Frombald (1725)

COPY OF A WRITING FROM THE GRADISKA DISTRICT IN HUNGARY / COPIA EINES SCHREIBENS AUS DEM GRADISKER DISTRICT IN UNGARN by Frombald (1725)

or (the original full title)

Copy of the letter dated 1725 of the imperial cameral provisor of Gradiska district in the Kingdom of Serbia, Mr. Frombald, which relates to the so-called vampiri or blood-suckers, which were notori-ous in the Kingdom of Serbia in those times

In 1725, in the village of Kisilova in Serbia - then considered part of Hungary by the Austro-Hungarian Empire - the administrator of the district, a so called Frombald, wrote a report describing a vampire case.

Frombald's original report is either lost or at present unknown. Only a copy exists in Vienna, in the Haus Hof und Staatsarchiv, in the stand Türkei (Turcica), entitled ‘Copy of the letter dated 1725 of the imperial cameral provisor of Gradiska district in the Kingdom of Serbia, Mr. Frombald, which relates to the so-called vampiri or blood-suckers, which were notori-ous in the Kingdom of Serbia in those times’ (‘Copia des vom Herrn Frombald kayserlichen Cameral Provisore zu Gradiska im Königreich Servien erlassenen Briefes anno 1725, Die im Königreich Servien damals im Schwung gegangenen sogenannten vampiri oder Blutsauger betreffend’. Frombald 1725). The undated copy is filed into the documents relating to 1725 January-February.

The report was published without comment in the 21.07.1725. issue of the Wienerisches Diarium under the modified and fairly uninteresting title ‘Copy of a writing from the Gradiska District in Hungary’.

From The Imperial Provisor, Gradsk District

"After a subject by the name of Peter Plogojowitz had died, ten weeks past - he lived in the village of Kisilova, in the Rahm district - and had been buried according to the Raetzian custom, it was revealed that in this same village of Kisilova, within a week, nine people both young and old, died also, after suffering a twenty-four hour illness. And they said publicly, while they were yet alive, but on their deathbed, that the above-mentioned Peter Plogojowitz, who had died ten weeks earlier had come to them in their sleep, laid himself on them, and throttled them, so that they would have to give up the ghost. The other subjects were very distressed and strengthened even more in such beliefs by the fact that the dead Peter Plogojowitz's wife, after saying that her husband had come to her and demanded his opanki, or shoes, had left the village of Kisilova and gone to another."

"And since with such people (which they call vampires) various (physical signs) are to be seen - that is, the body decomposed, the skin, hair, beard and nails growing - the subjects resolved unanimously to open the grave of Peter Plogojowitz and to see if such above-mentioned signs were really to be found on him. To this end they came here to me and, telling me of these events, asked me and the local pope, or parish priest, to be present at the viewing (The peasants' custom of referring to priests in such districts as 'popes' survived well into the 20th Century).And although I at first disapproved, telling them that the praiseworthy administration should first be dutifully and humbly informed, and its exalted opinion about this should be heard, they didn't want to accomodate themselves to this at all, but rather gave this short answer: I could do what I wanted, but (if) I didn't accord them the viewing and the legal recognition to deal with the body according to their custom, they would have to leave the house and home, because by the time a gracious resolution was received from Belgrade, perhaps the entire village - and this was already (said) to have happened in Turkish times - could be destroyed by such an evil spirit, and they did not want to wait for this."

"Since I could not hold these people from the resolution they had made, either with good words or with threats, I went to the village of Kisilova, taking along the Gradisk pope, and viewed the body of Peter Plogojowitz, just exumed, finding, in accordance to truthfulness, that first of all, I did not the slightest ordor that is characteristic of the dead, and the body, except for the nose which has somewhat fallen away, was completely fresh. The hair and beard - even the nails, of which the old ones had fallen away - had grown on him; the old skin, which was somewhat whitish, had peeled away, and a new one had emerged from it. The face, hands and feet and the whole body were so constituted, that they could not have been more complete in his lifetime. Not without astonishment, I saw some fresh blood in his mouth, which according to the common observation, he had sucked from the people killed by him. In short, all the indications were present that such people (as remarked above) are said to have."

"After the pope and I had seen this spectacle, while people grew more outraged than distressed, all the subjects, with great speed, sharpened a stake - in order to pierce the corpse of the deceased with it - and put this at his heart, whereupon, as he was pierced, not only did much blood, completely fresh, flow also through his ears and mouth, but still other wild signs (which I pass by out of high respect)* took place. Finally, according to their usual practise, they burned the above-mentioned body, in hoc casu, to ashes of which I (now)inform the most laudable Administration, and at the same time would like to request, obediently and humbly, that if a mistake was made in this matter, such is to be attributed not to me but to the rabble, who were beside themselves with fear."